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Re: Excel Column Headings



Sender: Scott Klement <sk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>


I'm FTPing a .csv file to my server so the end users can open it in Excel. Everything works fine except they don't get column headings.

FTP only transfers files over a network. It does not convert them from one format to another, it just transfers them. It's basically just a copy program that operates over a network.


I realize that Client Access, as well as other programs that are intended as alternatives to CA, will do a lot more than just copy the data. They'll reformat it into completely different formats in order to make the data compatible with particular applications.

However, FTP doesn't work that way. It just copies files, it doesn't reformat them to fit your PC applications. You need to reformat them as a separate step and with separate software.

Since your file is already in CSV format, I'm guessing that you've already found software. Maybe it's CPYTOIMPF or maybe it's a 3rd party utility like Martin Rowe's. In any case, it's THAT utility that's missing the ability to add the column headings, not FTP.

You could consider writing a simple program or even a QShell script that adds the headings. Or, you could write a program that outputs a real Excel spreadsheet in the first place (rather than a database file that then gets convered to a CSV stream file, that then gets converted to an Excel spreadsheet). Creating a genuine Excel spreadsheet would allow you to do any Excel function, including adding column headings, underlines, fonts, colors, formulas... the list goes on...

But none of that is really related to FTP. It's related to the program that you run before you do the FTP.

Hope that helps...

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